Ocean Heat Content

Satellites and weather stations on land show that average air temperature at the surface is going up. Consequently, we see an increase in the number of heat wave events and the area affected by drought.

Data Trends

Ocean Heat Content Time Series Data Plot

Feature Articles

Climate Change: Ocean Heat Content
The ocean is the largest solar energy collector on Earth. Not only does water cover more than 70 percent of our planet's surface, it can also absorb large amounts of heat without a large increase in temperature…

Videos/Multimedia

El Niño
This National Geographic video explains the origins of the El Niño Southern Oscillation using animations and shows the impacts on humans, wildlife and habitat, particularly in the United States.

Coral Reefs in Hot Water
Coral Reefs in Hot Water is a short video displaying computerized data collected on the number of reefs impacted by coral bleaching around the world.

Climate Change and the Global Ocean
This NASA video presents a broad overview of what NASA satellites can tell us about how climate change is affecting oceans. It is available in various formats and includes a transcript.

These resources come from the CLEAN project, a part of the National Science Digital Library. This collection provides a scientific and education reviewed collection of resources coupled with the tools to enable an online community to share and discuss teaching about climate and energy science. NOAA is a partner in the CLEAN project.